Thomas Jefferson Article Outline (Thomas Jefferson Celebrates the Virtue of the Yeoman Farmer, 1785) Topic: In Europe the lands are either cultivated, or locked up against the cultivator. Manufacture must therefore be resorted to of necessity not of choice, to support the surplus of their people. But we have an immensity of land courting the industry of the husbandman. Is it best then that all our citizens should be employed in its improvements, or that one half should be called off from that to exercise manufactures and handicraft arts for the other? Evidence:
A- Labor in earth are ppl chosen from God
1- Chosen ppl, made His peculiar deposit for substantial and genuine virtue.
B- Corruption of morals in the mass of cultivators is a phenomenon of which no age or nation has furnished an example.
1- Mark set on those, who don’t look up to heaven, to their own soil and industry, as the husbandman, for their living (subsistence), depends for it on casualties and sudden change of mind (caprice) of customers.
C- Dependence exists less important and susceptible to bribery or corruption, suffocates the germ of virtue, and prepares fit tools for design of ambition.
1- The natural progress and consequence of the arts, has sometimes been slowed down (retarded) by accidental circumstances.
2- The proportion which the mass (aggregate) of the other classes of citizens bears in any State to that of its husbandmen, is the proportion of its unsound to its healthy parts, and is a good enough barometer whereby to measure its degree of corruption.
D- Having land to labor then, let never to wish to see citizens occupied at a workbench, or twirling a distaff.
1- Carpenters, masons, smiths, are wanting in husbandry; but, for the general operations of manufacture, let workshops remain in Europe.
2- It is better to carry provisions and materials to workmen there (Europe), than bring them to the provisions and materials, and with them their manners and principles.
a- The loss by the transportation of commodities across the Atlantic will be made up in happiness and permanence of government; the mobs of great cities add so much to the support of pure government, as sores do to the strength of the human body.
Hamilton Economy Pages 1-3 Topic Sentence: Ideas of Alexander Hamilton to help improve America Evidence:
- The division of labor
- An extension of the use of machinery
- Additional employment to classes of the community not ordinarily engaged in the business
- The promoting of emigration from foreign Countries
- The furnishing greater scope for the diversity of talents and dispositions which discriminate men from each other.
Topic Sentence: Three circumstances Evidence:
- The greater skill and dexterity naturally resulting from a constant and undivided application to a single object.
- The economy of time by avoiding the loss of it, incident to a frequent transition from one operation to another of a different nature
- An extension of the use of Machinery. A man occupied on a single object will have it more in his power, and will be more naturally led to exert his imagination variety of independent and dissimilar operations
-
Topic Sentence: Machinery forms an item of great importance in the general mass of national industry. Evidence:
- Artificial force brought in aid of the natural force of man
- Purposes of labor is increase of hands
- Contribute most to the general Stock of industrious effort Topic Sentence: To cherish and stimulate the activity of the human mind Evidence:
- Multiplying the objects of enterprise, is not among the least considerable of the expedients, by which the wealth of a nation may be promoted
- Every new scene, which is opened to the busy nature of man to rouse and exert itself, is the addition of new energy to the general stock of effort
Topic Sentence: The creating a new and securing in all a more certain and steady demand, for the surplus produce of the soil. Evidence:
- The establishment of manufactures contributes to an augmentation of the produce or revenue of a country
- Has an immediate and direct relation to the prosperity of agriculture Topic Sentence: Evident that the exertions of the husbandman will be steady or fluctuating Evidence:
- For the vent of the surplus,
- May be produced by his labor
- Such surplus in the ordinary course of things will be greater or less in the same proportion Topic Sentence: Primary object of the policy of nations, to able to supply themselves with subsistence form their own soils Evidence:
- Raw materials necessary for their own fabrics
- Nations who have neither mines nor manufactures ,can only obtain the manufactured articles, of which they stand in need, by an exchange of the products of their soils Topic Sentence: Natural causes tending to render the external demand for the surplus of agricultural nations a precarious reliance. Evidence:
- The differences of seasons, in the countries, which are the consumers make immense differences in the produce of their own soils
- Consequently in the degrees of their necessity for foreign supply Plentiful harvests with them, especially if similar one occur at the same time in the countries, which are the furnishers, occasion of course a glut in the markets if the latter. Hamilton Economy Page 4 Topic: Strong reasons to regard the foreign demand for that surplus as too uncertain a reliance, and to desire a substitute for it, in an extensive domestic market. Evidence:
A- Considering how fast and how much progress of new settlements in the U.S. must increase surplus produce of the soil
B- Weighing seriously on the tendency of the system that prevails among most of commercial nations of Europe.
C- Dependence may be placed on the force of natural circumstances to counteract the effects on artificial policy. Topic: To secure such a market, there is no other expedient, than to promote manufacturing establishments. Evidence:
A- Manufacturers who constitute the most numerous class, after the Cultivators of land, are (for that reason) the principal consumers of the surplus of their labour. Topic: Idea of an extensive domestic market for the surplus produce of the soil is of the 1st consequence. Evidence:
A- It is what most effectually conduces to a flourishing state of Agriculture.
B- If effect of manufactories should detach a portion of the hands it might possibly cause a smaller quantity of lands to be under cultivation.
1- But by their tendency to produce a more certain demand for the surplus produce of the soil, at the same time they would cause the lands which were in cultivation to better improved and more productive.
C- By their influence the condition of each individual farmer would be improved (meliorated) and the total mass of Agricultural production would probably be increased.
1- That depends as much and if not more upon the degree of improvement than upon the number of acres under culture. Topic: The multiplication of manufactories not only finishes a Market for those articles that are accustomed to be produced in abundance in a country but also creates a demand for such as were either unknown or produced in inconsiderable quantities. Evidence:
A- Bowels as well as the surface of the earth are ransacked for articles which were before neglected.
1- Animals, Plants, and Minerals acquire a utility and value, which were before unexplored. Topic: The foregoing considerations seem sufficient to establish as general propositions. Evidence:
A- It is the interest of nations to diversify the industrious pursuit of individuals who compose them. B-The establishment of manufactures is calculated not only to increase the general stock of useful and productive labour, but even to improve the state of Agriculture in particular to advance the interests of those who are engaged in it. Secondary Documents
Documentary Notes (Based on Alexander Hamilton)
-Wasn’t born in America/ Born in the West Indies.
-Published paper to tell people to rebel and be free from the British.
-“It is in war that a man makes his reputation”- quote said by Hamilton
-Opened law firm and opened first N.Y. Bank.
-Wanted to keep N.Y. capital to have economical and political activities in one place.
-Believed to have more opportunities in urban cities.
-Wanted to build N.Y. based on manufacture and industrialization (commercial).
-Spring of 1790-Hamilton economic programs were progressing but debt was most.
-Have federal gov’t pay for debt.
-South didn’t want to pay Northern debt.
-To him it was more important what the gov’t did than where it was located.
-Agreed with Compromise b/w Jefferson and he to make the federal gov’t pay for the debt in return to move the capital to Virginia because that gave him power over the people.
-Stock market exchange began.
-Made N.Y. an economical engine of the world.
-He believed it was creating a dynamic society where everyone with ability could rise.
-Cared a lot for N.Y. future. The Compromise of 1790
Page 1The Compromise of 1790-Early example of executive and legislative cooperation-Terms of the bargain were arranged at a dinner hosted by Jefferson.-Hamilton did not need to persuade the northerners to vote for the residence bill -However he had to stop them from interfering with the arrangement between Pennsylvania and the south.-Hamilton had to explain his position to Senator Rufus King Page 2Madison’s actions-Madison persuaded the three congressmen representing districts on the upper Potomac River to switch their votes-George Gale (a resident of Maryland) agreed to change vote.-Charles Carroll (owned twelve thousand acre estate) agreed to change vote on Madison’s request. Page 3Third Session of Congress-Held in Philadelphia-Confirmed compromise-Compromise included a federally chartered bank, domestically manufactured liquors, and a supplemental residence act allowing Washington to include his hometown of Alexandria within the federal district.-Two congressmen discuss some of the issues involved in passage of the bills. Page 4Famous Whiskey Rebellion in Pennsylvania-The tax was needed to cover the cost of the state depts.-Only six southerners voted for the bill in the House-They promised to support new revenues needed to cover the immediate cost of assuming the state depts. Page 5An Exciseman-The distillers and farmers pay all due deference and respect to congress will not refuse to contribute amply for support of govt. But resolved not to be harassed by the opprobrious character (in all free governments) Viz. an exciseman.
(Searching for the Soul Documents) (Page 299-300) Topic Sentence: New York had been the de facto capital of the nation since 1785, but the transition from Confederation to Constitution gave new snap and sophistication to life in the city. Evidence: A- People faced in New York 1-John Adams (Vice President) 2-Henry Knox (Secretary of War) 3- Edmund Randolph (Attorney General) B- People who arrived later on 1-Thomas Jefferson (American ambassador to France) a- came six months later to take up duties as secretary of state in New York 2- Many of the Republic's most famous men came to New York a- spring and summer of 1789 b- Also made the painter John Trumbull moved to city in December (came to finish portraits on his monumental canvas The Declaration of Independence Topic Sentence: Washington drew numerous prominent New Yorkers into the new federal orbit. Evidence: A- People drawn by Washington 1- John Jay- became 1st chief justice of Supreme Court. 2- Alexander Hamilton- named secretary of treasury on recommendation of Senator Robert Morris a-Hamilton in turn chose William Duer for assistant secretary of the treasury. 3- Governor Morris took post of ambassador to France. 4- General John Lamb became collector of the port. 5- Richard Harison got the office of U.S. attorney. 6- Chancellor Livingston who thought he deserved a cabinet-level appointment was the only notable New Yorker to be snubbed by the administration. 7- James Duane wanted to join General Philip Schuyler in the Senate he instead got the job of first judge of the federal district court of New York. 8- Governor Clinton arranged Rufus King to be selected to join General Philip Schuyler in the Senate a- King was a well connected Massachusetts politician who had just moved down to the city. 9- Richard Varcik took over as mayor.
(Page 300-301) Topic Sentence: Municipal and state officials did their best to accommodate the federal government’s need for space and quiet deliberation. Evidence: A- Congress complained that the ringing of bells at funerals disturbed its deliberations. 1- Local authorities agreeably banned the practice. B- The chief executive’s hemorrhoids flared up and were insisted by doctors to stay in bed for six weeks. 2- A chain was stretched across the street outside his home to reduce the sound of traffic. C- Additional renovations were needed on Federal Hall 3- Officials organized a lottery to raise seventy-five hundred pounds. Topic Sentence: There was even talk about turning lower Manhattan into the federal district envisioned in the Constitution, complete with the government offices, residences, parks, and gardens. Evidence: A-1st plan was to designate Governor Island as the site for a presidential mansion B-After fort down workmen began construction of three story brick building C-Finish 2 years later called Government House Topic Sentence: New York a huge attractions Evidence: A-May stand in one place in this City and see as great a variety of faces, figure, and Characters as Hogarth or Le Sage B-Hurly burly and bustle of a large town Topics Sentence: Many advertisements open up meaning plenty of other things to do Evidence: A-Reopened the John Street Theater B-A new racetrack was open C-Two pleasure gardens were open D-Untied States pitched its advertisement to the “ Fair Sex” E-Excellent ice cream was introduce Topic Sentence: New York shouldn’t be the Capital Evidence: A-From far from popular choice B-Its raw juxtapositions of wealth and poverty
(Page 301-302) Topic Sentence: How New Yorkers look Evidence: A-2 women wore dresses which exposed much of their bosoms B-Many say the republicans but don’t act like it C-Thomas Jefferson doesn’t notice that he is the only republican in town Topic Sentence: Very worrisome indeed, notwithstanding the suit of plain brown broadcloth in which Washington took the oath of office, was the courtly style of entertaining adopted by the chief executive and his wife. Evidence: Chief executive and his wife adopted entertainment A-On Tuesday afternoon levees and her Friday evening receptions were numerously attended by all that was fashionable, elegant, and refined in society B-Full dress were required for all C-When the president appeared in public, it was noted, bands sometimes struck up “ God Save the King” Topic Sentence:President took advantage of money Evidence: A-Had a household staff of twenty servants, maids, housekeepers, cooks, and coachmen B-Washington moves his official residence from Cherry Street to the mansion built by Alexander Macomb at Number 39 Broadway, an even grander house at a better address. Topic Sentence: New York’s champions, numerous and articulate, pooh-poohed all the commotion. Evidence: A-Oliver Wolcott made city sound like a bastion of propriety (defends well being). B-Other advocates of the city emphasized its beauty and temperate climate. C-Local physician and president of Medical Society Dr. John Bard pronounced New York “one of the healthiest cities of the continent.” 1-Proof of his assertion was said by him as “was readily visible in the complexion, health and vigor of its inhabitants.” (Page 302) Topic Sentence: What couldn’t be shrugged off so easily was New York’s growing notoriety as a cauldron of financial speculation. Evidence: A-Over the previous half-dozen years “moneyed men” throughout the U.S. had come to think of heavily depreciated state and Continental securities as good investments. B-If American experiment in self-government succeeded, the value of their holdings would be multiplied many times over. C-Tempo of speculation quickened months before Washington’s inauguration as investors became more certain that new federal gov’t would take immediate steps to put the nation’s finances in order. Topic Sentence: New York afforded speculators two advantages; Rapid population growth- and above all a stream of immigrants with cash, credit, and connections- favored the city with an abundance of capital. Evidence: A-New York churned with valuable rumors, tips, and inside information that took days, even weeks, to reach buyers and sellers elsewhere. B-There was no substitute for rubbing elbows with important people in the government on a day-to-day basis says Andrew Craige. Topic Sentence: The early summer of 1789 brought word that southern state securities were both cheap and plentiful, some selling for as little as ten cents on the dollar. Evidence: A-Over next 6 months seventy-odd New Yorkers scooped up $2.7 million worth of South Carolina, North Carolina, and Virginia obligations- roughly a 3rd of their outstanding debts. B-Herman LeRoy and William Bayard lead the pack with the firm of a combined investment of over $580,000. C-Andrew Craige and 4 others were each in for a hundred thousand dollars or more. D-William Constable who was another participant told an English investor that “those in secret” expected to come away with huge profits in the very near future.
(Page 303) Topic Sentence: Constable’s “secret” was that Treasury Secretary Hamilton would soon go before Congress with a financial plan calculated to boost the value of state and federal securities. Evidence: A-No evidence exists that Hamilton breached the confidentiality of his office. B-However, Assistant Treasury Secretary Duer talked freely to Constable and their other New York friends and was himself deeply involved in speculation. C-Since Hamilton knew of Duer’s activities and did nothing about it encouraged the widespread suspicion that he was masterminding a corrupt conspiracy against the republic. Topic Sentence: The denouement came in mid-January 1790, when Congress received from Hamilton a 50 page Report Relative to Public Credit. Evidence: A-The total- nearly eighty million dollars- was the country’s “price of liberty” Hamilton said. 1-According to Hamilton’s figures, the unpaid foreign and domestic debts of the U.S. amounted to some 54 million dollars. 2-Outstanding state debts amounted to another 25 million. B-Neither the old Confederation nor many of the states had fulfilled their duty to pay off this sacred debt as promised added Hamilton. C-Annual revenues of the new federal gov’t weren’t enough to cover debt and numerous public creditors have been waiting for their money for years. D-Intolerable negligence bought the nation to a “critical juncture.” E-Not only was “the individual and aggregate prosperity of the citizens of the United states” in jeopardy but also the “character as a People” and “the cause of good government” hung in the balance as well. Topic Sentence: No one in Congress opposed paying the national debt. Evidence: A-Issue was who owned how much to whom and where the money would come from. B-1st Congress should consolidate the various foreign and domestic debts incurred by both the confederation and the federal gov’ts since 1776 and “assume” unpaid state Revolutionary debts with interest. C-2nd it should “fund” the whole amount that would provide sufficient revenue to pat the interest and part of the principal every year. D-Out of the 6 plans Hamilton gave the Congress one was chosen that called for state and federal creditors to exchange their old notes for new 6% federal “stock” and any interest would be paid in 3% stock. Topic Sentence: Without funding and assumption, Hamilton reasoned, the United States could never achieve the stability, prosperity, and strength it needed to survive. Evidence: A-Related to Britain, the creation of a funded national debt would restore the gov’t’s credit among those persons, at home and aboard, who possessed “active wealth.” B-Assumption of “state debts” would bind every public creditor to the new federal system by powerful “ligaments of interest.” C-Funding and assumption would cement the union by enhancing the authority and reputation of the central gov’t vis-à-vis the states and economically do wonders for the country. D-Public confidence in gov’t stock would enable it to function like money, thereby increasing the money supply, driving down interest rates, and stimulating the development of agriculture, commerce, and industry.
(Page 304-305) Topic Sentence: No sooner had Hamilton’s report become public knowledge, Chancellor Livingston reported sourly, than a mania for speculation in the public securities immediately “invaded all ranks of people.” Evidence: A-New York went wild; prominent Antifederalists like George Clinton and Melancton Smith took the plunge. B-Big investors became celebrities. C-Stories circulated of their high-stakes derring-do, richly embroidered with talk of secret couriers and chests full of cash. Topic Sentence: Prince of the New York speculators was none other than William Duer. Evidence: A-After less than 6 months, Duer abruptly resigned from the treasury and promptly threw himself into daring and complex schemes. B-Through his wide network of connections in the United States and Europe, he arranged for or encouraged the influx of millions of dollars from investors in Boston, Philadelphia, Amsterdam, Paris, London, and elsewhere. C-Suddenly 1 of the richest men in the country attended by a regiment of servants and fawned over by important visitors; Jefferson called him “the king of the alley.” D-Rev. Manasseh Cutler, who attended one of the chic dinner parties given by Duer and his wife, had never seen anything like it. 1-Rev. presumed he had not less than 15 diff. sorts of wine at dinner and after the cloth was removed, besides most excellent cider, porter, and several kinds of strong beer. Topic Sentence: Outside New York, and to no small degree because of the financial delirium there, Hamilton’s proposals roused fiery resentment. Evidence: A-Funding at par, by allowing creditors to swap depreciated obligations for new interest-bearing paper at face value, was legalized fraud, critics said. B-Speculators with money and inside information were ranking in immense unearned profits at the expense of patriotic republicans who had been tricked out of their property. C-Assumption angered the South; Northern states stood to gain a financial windfall at the expense of southern taxpayers. D-Northern speculators had by now bought up so much of the outstanding southern state debt that they would pocket the real profits of assumption-again at southern expense. Topic Sentence: In Congress, James Madison of Virginia railed opponents of Hamilton’s proposals with two of his own: no assumption of state debts at all and no funding of the national debt without making a distinction between the original and subsequent holders of government paper. Evidence: A-Debate over Madison’s alternatives went on inside Congress and out for weeks; toward the end of February the House defeated his discrimination idea. B-Assumption failed a preliminary vote in med-April. C-By early June, while more or less certain that his funding scheme would get through, Hamilton was increasingly fearful that assumption wouldn’t survive a second and decisive ballot. Topic Sentence: It was at this juncture, Jefferson later recalled, that Hamilton offered a compromise. Evidence: A-Two men chanced to meet one day in the street just outside the president’s house Hamilton appeared “somber, haggard, & dejected beyond despair, even his dress uncouth & neglected.” B-Hamilton begged Jefferson to reassure southern congressmen that assumption was vital to the well-being of the republic; in return, he would round up enough northern votes to move the national to a site on the Potomac River. C-Anxious to get the government out of the clutches of New York “moneyed men,” Jefferson suggested that Hamilton and Madison join him for next dinner the next evening at his house on Maiden Lane where there the bargain was sealed.
(Page 305) Topic Sentence: At the Poughkeepsie convention, New York Federalists had more or less promised that the federal government would remain in New York if the Constitution were ratified. Evidence: A-New York Federalists geared up to fight to keep the federal gov’t in N.Y. as long as possible. 1-If failed to have the federal district located along the Susquehanna or even in Baltimore. B-Hamilton was adamant and he told Senator Rufus King that his financial program was “the primary object, all subordinate points which oppose it must be sacrificed,” and King and others did as told. C-Early in July the Congress voted to build a permanent capital in a ten-mile-square federal district on the Potomac for the remainder of the decade. 1-Pending completion of the necessary construction, the gov’t would return to Philadelphia. 2-Both houses approved assumption as well as funding, completing Hamilton’s victory. Topic Sentence: On August 12, 1790, Congress met for the last time in Federal Hall. Evidence: A-Washington stepped into a barge moored at Macomb’s Wharf on the Hudson and left Manhattan 2 weeks later, on August 30, never to return. B-Abigail Adams vowed to make the best of Philadelphia but knew that “when all is done, it will not be Broadway.”
(Page 306-307) Topic Sentence: New Yorkers watched the federal departure with both regret and irritation. Evidence: A-One resident lamented “No more Levee days and nights, no more dancing [arties out of town thro’ this summer, no more assemblies in town thro’ winter.” B-Everyone blamed the Pennsylvanians and William Maclay, who never liked New York, replied that its residents “resemble bad school-boys who are unfortunate at play; they revenge themselves by telling notorious thumpers.” C-Washington came in for a share of abuse when he signed the Potomac bill into law but Hamilton, whose role in the deal wouldn’t come to light for years, emerged unscathed. Topic Sentence: Yet by the end of the summer, the loss of the capital had been forgotten. Evidence: A-Passage of funding and assumption bills restored b/w 40 and 60 million dollars in hitherto virtually worthless certificates of indebtedness to face value. 1-A sudden accession of wealth that bathed the city, or at least its successful spectators, in prosperity. B-State gov’t even invested a couple of million dollars in securities that, redeemed at par, brought a tidy sum into the treasury. C-Eager investors were meanwhile bidding up the price of the new 6% and 3% federal securities, dreaming of fortunes to come. Topic Sentence: To a visiting British diplomat, the city’s future seemed utterly secure, capital or no capital. Evidence: A-The diplomat said New York “is certainly favored to be first city in North America, and this superiority it will most assuredly retain whatever spot be made seat of government.” Topic Sentence: It was an arresting thought: henceforth the United States would have two centers, one governmental, the other economic. Evidence: A-The separation of powers, as emphatic as anything in the Constitution, had no parallel in the Western world. 1-London, Paris, Amsterdam, Berlin, Vienna, Rome, Madrid, Lisbon were capitals in the fullest sense of the word, hubs of national politics, business, and culture. B-The New York promised to be the 1st of the U.S. that was independent of the apparatus of state power, was an augury of its uniqueness. 1-Nowhere else in the republic would the marketplace come to reign with such authority, or painters and politicians alike bow so low before gods of business and finance. 2-New York was no longer the capital city; its destiny was to be the city of capital. Topic Sentence: Some New Yorkers wanted the city to become a center of industrial manufacturing too-filled with English-style factories, not just the small artisanal workshops with which it had long been well supplied. Evidence: A-In January 1789 at Rawson’s Tavern on Water Street, a committee of prominent businessmen formed the Society for the Encouragement of American Manufactures, commonly known as the New York Manufacturing Society. B-The inception of a new federal gov’t, President Washington’s words of encouragement for the country’s infant textile industry, and the strength of the city’s capital market suggested that a large-scale manufacturing was an idea whose time had come. 1-Governor Clinton had been heard to say “the promotion of manufactures is at all times highly worthy of the attention of the government.” C-No one surprised when nearly 2 hundred investors bought up all Manufacturing Society stock at 25 dollars per share. (Page 307) Topic Sentence: Before the year was out, the Manufacturing Society had opened a textile factory on Crown (later Liberty) Street. Evidence: A-Had a carding machine and two hand-operated spinning jennies, and it employed 14 weavers and 130 spinners, an impressive labor force by contemporary standards; also said to have cost $57,500-almost as much as the city spent to renovate Federal Hall. B-Samuel Slater, a young Derbyshire immigrant, offered to build and install from memory the spinning Jennies whose design the British gov’t guarded as carefully as crowned jewels. 1-Factory managers turned him down and within a year or two were forced to close their doors. C-Slater later moved to Pawtucket, Rhode Island, where he built the 1st successful cotton mill in the U.S. for the firm of Almy and Brown. Topic Sentence: Advocates of manufacturing didn’t quit. Evidence: A-The New York Society for the Promotion of Agriculture, Arts, and Manufactures, founded in 1791 by Robert R. Livingston and others, remained for yrs as 1 of the country’s leading exponents of direct gov’t support for American industrial development. B-Congress was bombarded with demands to protect infant industries from foreign (esp. British) competition by local organizations of manufactures and workingmen. C-Individual entrepreneurs, including man British immigrants and New Englanders, went on experimenting with cotton mills, iron foundries, pottery works, breweries, and thread mills. 1-One visitor saw a cotton mill at Hell Gate on the East River on 1794. Topic Sentence: The demise of the Manufacturing Society was nonetheless a signal that a large-scale industrial manufacturing faced immense obstacles in New York. Evidence: A-Manhattan lacked the water power necessary for mills and factories. B-City real estate was already very expensive, almost prohibitively so for high-risk ventures that might take years to show a profit. 1-Inexperienced management, the lack of up-to-date technology, and competition from low-cost British imports compounded the problem. 2-Investors could almost always do better, with less danger, in shipping, insurance, and other mercantile enterprises, to say nothing of land speculation. C-Over time more of New York’s merchants and financiers came to think of manufacturing as a nuisance. It threatened to open competitive outlets for capital, they charged, while the protectionist trade policies advocated by its proponents posed a danger to the free movement of goods, money, and credit across national boundaries.
Primary Documents
Thomas Jefferson Article Outline
(Thomas Jefferson Celebrates the Virtue of the Yeoman Farmer, 1785)
Topic: In Europe the lands are either cultivated, or locked up against the cultivator. Manufacture must therefore be resorted to of necessity not of choice, to support the surplus of their people. But we have an immensity of land courting the industry of the husbandman. Is it best then that all our citizens should be employed in its improvements, or that one half should be called off from that to exercise manufactures and handicraft arts for the other?
Evidence:
A- Labor in earth are ppl chosen from God
1- Chosen ppl, made His peculiar deposit for substantial and genuine virtue.
B- Corruption of morals in the mass of cultivators is a phenomenon of which no age or nation has furnished an example.
1- Mark set on those, who don’t look up to heaven, to their own soil and industry, as the husbandman, for their living (subsistence), depends for it on casualties and sudden change of mind (caprice) of customers.
C- Dependence exists less important and susceptible to bribery or corruption, suffocates the germ of virtue, and prepares fit tools for design of ambition.
1- The natural progress and consequence of the arts, has sometimes been slowed down (retarded) by accidental circumstances.
2- The proportion which the mass (aggregate) of the other classes of citizens bears in any State to that of its husbandmen, is the proportion of its unsound to its healthy parts, and is a good enough barometer whereby to measure its degree of corruption.
D- Having land to labor then, let never to wish to see citizens occupied at a workbench, or twirling a distaff.
1- Carpenters, masons, smiths, are wanting in husbandry; but, for the general operations of manufacture, let workshops remain in Europe.
2- It is better to carry provisions and materials to workmen there (Europe), than bring them to the provisions and materials, and with them their manners and principles.
a- The loss by the transportation of commodities across the Atlantic will be made up in happiness and permanence of government; the mobs of great cities add so much to the support of pure government, as sores do to the strength of the human body.
Hamilton Economy Pages 1-3
Topic Sentence: Ideas of Alexander Hamilton to help improve America
Evidence:
- The division of labor
- An extension of the use of machinery
- Additional employment to classes of the community not ordinarily engaged in the business
- The promoting of emigration from foreign Countries
- The furnishing greater scope for the diversity of talents and dispositions which discriminate men from each other.
Topic Sentence: Three circumstances
Evidence:
- The greater skill and dexterity naturally resulting from a constant and undivided application to a single object.
- The economy of time by avoiding the loss of it, incident to a frequent transition from one operation to another of a different nature
- An extension of the use of Machinery. A man occupied on a single object will have it more in his power, and will be more naturally led to exert his imagination variety of independent and dissimilar operations
-
Topic Sentence: Machinery forms an item of great importance in the general mass of national industry.
Evidence:
- Artificial force brought in aid of the natural force of man
- Purposes of labor is increase of hands
- Contribute most to the general Stock of industrious effort
Topic Sentence: To cherish and stimulate the activity of the human mind
Evidence:
- Multiplying the objects of enterprise, is not among the least considerable of the expedients, by which the wealth of a nation may be promoted
- Every new scene, which is opened to the busy nature of man to rouse and exert itself, is the addition of new energy to the general stock of effort
Topic Sentence: The creating a new and securing in all a more certain and steady demand, for the surplus produce of the soil.
Evidence:
- The establishment of manufactures contributes to an augmentation of the produce or revenue of a country
- Has an immediate and direct relation to the prosperity of agriculture
Topic Sentence: Evident that the exertions of the husbandman will be steady or fluctuating
Evidence:
- For the vent of the surplus,
- May be produced by his labor
- Such surplus in the ordinary course of things will be greater or less in the same proportion
Topic Sentence: Primary object of the policy of nations, to able to supply themselves with subsistence form their own soils
Evidence:
- Raw materials necessary for their own fabrics
- Nations who have neither mines nor manufactures ,can only obtain the manufactured articles, of which they stand in need, by an exchange of the products of their soils
Topic Sentence: Natural causes tending to render the external demand for the surplus of agricultural nations a precarious reliance.
Evidence:
- The differences of seasons, in the countries, which are the consumers make immense differences in the produce of their own soils
- Consequently in the degrees of their necessity for foreign supply
Plentiful harvests with them, especially if similar one occur at the same time in the countries, which are the furnishers, occasion of course a glut in the markets if the latter.
Hamilton Economy Page 4
Topic: Strong reasons to regard the foreign demand for that surplus as too uncertain a reliance, and to desire a substitute for it, in an extensive domestic market.
Evidence:
A- Considering how fast and how much progress of new settlements in the U.S. must increase surplus produce of the soil
B- Weighing seriously on the tendency of the system that prevails among most of commercial nations of Europe.
C- Dependence may be placed on the force of natural circumstances to counteract the effects on artificial policy.
Topic: To secure such a market, there is no other expedient, than to promote manufacturing establishments.
Evidence:
A- Manufacturers who constitute the most numerous class, after the Cultivators of land, are (for that reason) the principal consumers of the surplus of their labour.
Topic: Idea of an extensive domestic market for the surplus produce of the soil is of the 1st consequence.
Evidence:
A- It is what most effectually conduces to a flourishing state of Agriculture.
B- If effect of manufactories should detach a portion of the hands it might possibly cause a smaller quantity of lands to be under cultivation.
1- But by their tendency to produce a more certain demand for the surplus produce of the soil, at the same time they would cause the lands which were in cultivation to better improved and more productive.
C- By their influence the condition of each individual farmer would be improved (meliorated) and the total mass of Agricultural production would probably be increased.
1- That depends as much and if not more upon the degree of improvement than upon the number of acres under culture.
Topic: The multiplication of manufactories not only finishes a Market for those articles that are accustomed to be produced in abundance in a country but also creates a demand for such as were either unknown or produced in inconsiderable quantities.
Evidence:
A- Bowels as well as the surface of the earth are ransacked for articles which were before neglected.
1- Animals, Plants, and Minerals acquire a utility and value, which were before unexplored.
Topic: The foregoing considerations seem sufficient to establish as general propositions.
Evidence:
A- It is the interest of nations to diversify the industrious pursuit of individuals who compose them.
B-The establishment of manufactures is calculated not only to increase the general stock of useful and productive labour, but even to improve the state of Agriculture in particular to advance the interests of those who are engaged in it.
Secondary Documents
Documentary Notes
(Based on Alexander Hamilton)
-Wasn’t born in America/ Born in the West Indies.
-Published paper to tell people to rebel and be free from the British.
-“It is in war that a man makes his reputation”- quote said by Hamilton
-Opened law firm and opened first N.Y. Bank.
-Wanted to keep N.Y. capital to have economical and political activities in one place.
-Believed to have more opportunities in urban cities.
-Wanted to build N.Y. based on manufacture and industrialization (commercial).
-Spring of 1790-Hamilton economic programs were progressing but debt was most.
-Have federal gov’t pay for debt.
-South didn’t want to pay Northern debt.
-To him it was more important what the gov’t did than where it was located.
-Agreed with Compromise b/w Jefferson and he to make the federal gov’t pay for the debt in return to move the capital to Virginia because that gave him power over the people.
-Stock market exchange began.
-Made N.Y. an economical engine of the world.
-He believed it was creating a dynamic society where everyone with ability could rise.
-Cared a lot for N.Y. future.
The Compromise of 1790
Page 1The Compromise of 1790- Early example of executive and legislative cooperation- Terms of the bargain were arranged at a dinner hosted by Jefferson.- Hamilton did not need to persuade the northerners to vote for the residence bill - However he had to stop them from interfering with the arrangement between Pennsylvania and the south.- Hamilton had to explain his position to Senator Rufus King
Page 2Madison’s actions- Madison persuaded the three congressmen representing districts on the upper Potomac River to switch their votes- George Gale (a resident of Maryland) agreed to change vote.- Charles Carroll (owned twelve thousand acre estate) agreed to change vote on Madison’s request.
Page 3Third Session of Congress- Held in Philadelphia- Confirmed compromise- Compromise included a federally chartered bank, domestically manufactured liquors, and a supplemental residence act allowing Washington to include his hometown of Alexandria within the federal district.- Two congressmen discuss some of the issues involved in passage of the bills.
Page 4Famous Whiskey Rebellion in Pennsylvania- The tax was needed to cover the cost of the state depts.- Only six southerners voted for the bill in the House- They promised to support new revenues needed to cover the immediate cost of assuming the state depts.
Page 5An Exciseman- The distillers and farmers pay all due deference and respect to congress will not refuse to contribute amply for support of govt. But resolved not to be harassed by the opprobrious character (in all free governments) Viz. an exciseman.
(Searching for the Soul Documents)
(Page 299-300)
Topic Sentence: New York had been the de facto capital of the nation since 1785, but the transition from Confederation to Constitution gave new snap and sophistication to life in the city.
Evidence:
A- People faced in New York
1-John Adams (Vice President)
2-Henry Knox (Secretary of War)
3- Edmund Randolph (Attorney General)
B- People who arrived later on
1-Thomas Jefferson (American ambassador to France)
a- came six months later to take up duties as secretary of state in New York
2- Many of the Republic's most famous men came to New York
a- spring and summer of 1789
b- Also made the painter John Trumbull moved to city in December (came to finish portraits on his monumental canvas The Declaration of Independence
Topic Sentence: Washington drew numerous prominent New Yorkers into the new federal orbit.
Evidence:
A- People drawn by Washington
1- John Jay- became 1st chief justice of Supreme Court.
2- Alexander Hamilton- named secretary of treasury on recommendation of Senator Robert Morris
a- Hamilton in turn chose William Duer for assistant secretary of the treasury.
3- Governor Morris took post of ambassador to France.
4- General John Lamb became collector of the port.
5- Richard Harison got the office of U.S. attorney.
6- Chancellor Livingston who thought he deserved a cabinet-level appointment was the only notable New Yorker to be snubbed by the administration.
7- James Duane wanted to join General Philip Schuyler in the Senate he instead got the job of first judge of the federal district court of New York.
8- Governor Clinton arranged Rufus King to be selected to join General Philip Schuyler in the Senate
a- King was a well connected Massachusetts politician who had just moved down to the city.
9- Richard Varcik took over as mayor.
(Page 300-301)
Topic Sentence: Municipal and state officials did their best to accommodate the federal government’s need for space and quiet deliberation.
Evidence:
A- Congress complained that the ringing of bells at funerals disturbed its deliberations.
1- Local authorities agreeably banned the practice.
B- The chief executive’s hemorrhoids flared up and were insisted by doctors to stay in bed for six weeks.
2- A chain was stretched across the street outside his home to reduce the sound of traffic.
C- Additional renovations were needed on Federal Hall
3- Officials organized a lottery to raise seventy-five hundred pounds.
Topic Sentence: There was even talk about turning lower Manhattan into the federal district envisioned in the Constitution, complete with the government offices, residences, parks, and gardens.
Evidence:
A- 1st plan was to designate Governor Island as the site for a presidential mansion
B- After fort down workmen began construction of three story brick building
C- Finish 2 years later called Government House
Topic Sentence: New York a huge attractions
Evidence:
A- May stand in one place in this City and see as great a variety of faces, figure, and Characters as Hogarth or Le Sage
B- Hurly burly and bustle of a large town
Topics Sentence: Many advertisements open up meaning plenty of other things to do
Evidence:
A- Reopened the John Street Theater
B- A new racetrack was open
C- Two pleasure gardens were open
D- Untied States pitched its advertisement to the “ Fair Sex”
E- Excellent ice cream was introduce
Topic Sentence: New York shouldn’t be the Capital
Evidence:
A- From far from popular choice
B- Its raw juxtapositions of wealth and poverty
(Page 301-302)
Topic Sentence: How New Yorkers look
Evidence:
A- 2 women wore dresses which exposed much of their bosoms
B- Many say the republicans but don’t act like it
C- Thomas Jefferson doesn’t notice that he is the only republican in town
Topic Sentence: Very worrisome indeed, notwithstanding the suit of plain brown broadcloth in which Washington took the oath of office, was the courtly style of entertaining adopted by the chief executive and his wife.
Evidence: Chief executive and his wife adopted entertainment
A- On Tuesday afternoon levees and her Friday evening receptions were numerously attended by all that was fashionable, elegant, and refined in society
B- Full dress were required for all
C- When the president appeared in public, it was noted, bands sometimes struck up “ God Save the King”
Topic Sentence: President took advantage of money
Evidence:
A- Had a household staff of twenty servants, maids, housekeepers, cooks, and coachmen
B- Washington moves his official residence from Cherry Street to the mansion built by Alexander Macomb at Number 39 Broadway, an even grander house at a better address.
Topic Sentence: New York’s champions, numerous and articulate, pooh-poohed all the commotion.
Evidence:
A- Oliver Wolcott made city sound like a bastion of propriety (defends well being).
B- Other advocates of the city emphasized its beauty and temperate climate.
C- Local physician and president of Medical Society Dr. John Bard pronounced New York “one of the healthiest cities of the continent.”
1- Proof of his assertion was said by him as “was readily visible in the complexion, health and vigor of its inhabitants.”
(Page 302)
Topic Sentence: What couldn’t be shrugged off so easily was New York’s growing notoriety as a cauldron of financial speculation.
Evidence:
A- Over the previous half-dozen years “moneyed men” throughout the U.S. had come to think of heavily depreciated state and Continental securities as good investments.
B- If American experiment in self-government succeeded, the value of their holdings would be multiplied many times over.
C- Tempo of speculation quickened months before Washington’s inauguration as investors became more certain that new federal gov’t would take immediate steps to put the nation’s finances in order.
Topic Sentence: New York afforded speculators two advantages; Rapid population growth- and above all a stream of immigrants with cash, credit, and connections- favored the city with an abundance of capital.
Evidence:
A- New York churned with valuable rumors, tips, and inside information that took days, even weeks, to reach buyers and sellers elsewhere.
B- There was no substitute for rubbing elbows with important people in the government on a day-to-day basis says Andrew Craige.
Topic Sentence: The early summer of 1789 brought word that southern state securities were both cheap and plentiful, some selling for as little as ten cents on the dollar.
Evidence:
A- Over next 6 months seventy-odd New Yorkers scooped up $2.7 million worth of South Carolina, North Carolina, and Virginia obligations- roughly a 3rd of their outstanding debts.
B- Herman LeRoy and William Bayard lead the pack with the firm of a combined investment of over $580,000.
C- Andrew Craige and 4 others were each in for a hundred thousand dollars or more.
D- William Constable who was another participant told an English investor that “those in secret” expected to come away with huge profits in the very near future.
(Page 303)
Topic Sentence: Constable’s “secret” was that Treasury Secretary Hamilton would soon go before Congress with a financial plan calculated to boost the value of state and federal securities.
Evidence:
A- No evidence exists that Hamilton breached the confidentiality of his office.
B- However, Assistant Treasury Secretary Duer talked freely to Constable and their other New York friends and was himself deeply involved in speculation.
C- Since Hamilton knew of Duer’s activities and did nothing about it encouraged the widespread suspicion that he was masterminding a corrupt conspiracy against the republic.
Topic Sentence: The denouement came in mid-January 1790, when Congress received from Hamilton a 50 page Report Relative to Public Credit.
Evidence:
A- The total- nearly eighty million dollars- was the country’s “price of liberty” Hamilton said.
1- According to Hamilton’s figures, the unpaid foreign and domestic debts of the U.S. amounted to some 54 million dollars.
2- Outstanding state debts amounted to another 25 million.
B- Neither the old Confederation nor many of the states had fulfilled their duty to pay off this sacred debt as promised added Hamilton.
C- Annual revenues of the new federal gov’t weren’t enough to cover debt and numerous public creditors have been waiting for their money for years.
D- Intolerable negligence bought the nation to a “critical juncture.”
E- Not only was “the individual and aggregate prosperity of the citizens of the United states” in jeopardy but also the “character as a People” and “the cause of good government” hung in the balance as well.
Topic Sentence: No one in Congress opposed paying the national debt.
Evidence:
A- Issue was who owned how much to whom and where the money would come from.
B- 1st Congress should consolidate the various foreign and domestic debts incurred by both the confederation and the federal gov’ts since 1776 and “assume” unpaid state Revolutionary debts with interest.
C- 2nd it should “fund” the whole amount that would provide sufficient revenue to pat the interest and part of the principal every year.
D- Out of the 6 plans Hamilton gave the Congress one was chosen that called for state and federal creditors to exchange their old notes for new 6% federal “stock” and any interest would be paid in 3% stock.
Topic Sentence: Without funding and assumption, Hamilton reasoned, the United States could never achieve the stability, prosperity, and strength it needed to survive.
Evidence:
A- Related to Britain, the creation of a funded national debt would restore the gov’t’s credit among those persons, at home and aboard, who possessed “active wealth.”
B- Assumption of “state debts” would bind every public creditor to the new federal system by powerful “ligaments of interest.”
C- Funding and assumption would cement the union by enhancing the authority and reputation of the central gov’t vis-à-vis the states and economically do wonders for the country.
D- Public confidence in gov’t stock would enable it to function like money, thereby increasing the money supply, driving down interest rates, and stimulating the development of agriculture, commerce, and industry.
(Page 304-305)
Topic Sentence: No sooner had Hamilton’s report become public knowledge, Chancellor Livingston reported sourly, than a mania for speculation in the public securities immediately “invaded all ranks of people.”
Evidence:
A- New York went wild; prominent Antifederalists like George Clinton and Melancton Smith took the plunge.
B- Big investors became celebrities.
C- Stories circulated of their high-stakes derring-do, richly embroidered with talk of secret couriers and chests full of cash.
Topic Sentence: Prince of the New York speculators was none other than William Duer.
Evidence:
A- After less than 6 months, Duer abruptly resigned from the treasury and promptly threw himself into daring and complex schemes.
B- Through his wide network of connections in the United States and Europe, he arranged for or encouraged the influx of millions of dollars from investors in Boston, Philadelphia, Amsterdam, Paris, London, and elsewhere.
C- Suddenly 1 of the richest men in the country attended by a regiment of servants and fawned over by important visitors; Jefferson called him “the king of the alley.”
D- Rev. Manasseh Cutler, who attended one of the chic dinner parties given by Duer and his wife, had never seen anything like it.
1- Rev. presumed he had not less than 15 diff. sorts of wine at dinner and after the cloth was removed, besides most excellent cider, porter, and several kinds of strong beer.
Topic Sentence: Outside New York, and to no small degree because of the financial delirium there, Hamilton’s proposals roused fiery resentment.
Evidence:
A- Funding at par, by allowing creditors to swap depreciated obligations for new interest-bearing paper at face value, was legalized fraud, critics said.
B- Speculators with money and inside information were ranking in immense unearned profits at the expense of patriotic republicans who had been tricked out of their property.
C- Assumption angered the South; Northern states stood to gain a financial windfall at the expense of southern taxpayers.
D- Northern speculators had by now bought up so much of the outstanding southern state debt that they would pocket the real profits of assumption-again at southern expense.
Topic Sentence: In Congress, James Madison of Virginia railed opponents of Hamilton’s proposals with two of his own: no assumption of state debts at all and no funding of the national debt without making a distinction between the original and subsequent holders of government paper.
Evidence:
A- Debate over Madison’s alternatives went on inside Congress and out for weeks; toward the end of February the House defeated his discrimination idea.
B- Assumption failed a preliminary vote in med-April.
C- By early June, while more or less certain that his funding scheme would get through, Hamilton was increasingly fearful that assumption wouldn’t survive a second and decisive ballot.
Topic Sentence: It was at this juncture, Jefferson later recalled, that Hamilton offered a compromise.
Evidence:
A- Two men chanced to meet one day in the street just outside the president’s house Hamilton appeared “somber, haggard, & dejected beyond despair, even his dress uncouth & neglected.”
B- Hamilton begged Jefferson to reassure southern congressmen that assumption was vital to the well-being of the republic; in return, he would round up enough northern votes to move the national to a site on the Potomac River.
C- Anxious to get the government out of the clutches of New York “moneyed men,” Jefferson suggested that Hamilton and Madison join him for next dinner the next evening at his house on Maiden Lane where there the bargain was sealed.
(Page 305)
Topic Sentence: At the Poughkeepsie convention, New York Federalists had more or less promised that the federal government would remain in New York if the Constitution were ratified.
Evidence:
A- New York Federalists geared up to fight to keep the federal gov’t in N.Y. as long as possible.
1- If failed to have the federal district located along the Susquehanna or even in Baltimore.
B- Hamilton was adamant and he told Senator Rufus King that his financial program was “the primary object, all subordinate points which oppose it must be sacrificed,” and King and others did as told.
C- Early in July the Congress voted to build a permanent capital in a ten-mile-square federal district on the Potomac for the remainder of the decade.
1- Pending completion of the necessary construction, the gov’t would return to Philadelphia.
2- Both houses approved assumption as well as funding, completing Hamilton’s victory.
Topic Sentence: On August 12, 1790, Congress met for the last time in Federal Hall.
Evidence:
A- Washington stepped into a barge moored at Macomb’s Wharf on the Hudson and left Manhattan 2 weeks later, on August 30, never to return.
B- Abigail Adams vowed to make the best of Philadelphia but knew that “when all is done, it will not be Broadway.”
(Page 306-307)
Topic Sentence: New Yorkers watched the federal departure with both regret and irritation.
Evidence:
A- One resident lamented “No more Levee days and nights, no more dancing [arties out of town thro’ this summer, no more assemblies in town thro’ winter.”
B- Everyone blamed the Pennsylvanians and William Maclay, who never liked New York, replied that its residents “resemble bad school-boys who are unfortunate at play; they revenge themselves by telling notorious thumpers.”
C- Washington came in for a share of abuse when he signed the Potomac bill into law but Hamilton, whose role in the deal wouldn’t come to light for years, emerged unscathed.
Topic Sentence: Yet by the end of the summer, the loss of the capital had been forgotten.
Evidence:
A- Passage of funding and assumption bills restored b/w 40 and 60 million dollars in hitherto virtually worthless certificates of indebtedness to face value.
1- A sudden accession of wealth that bathed the city, or at least its successful spectators, in prosperity.
B- State gov’t even invested a couple of million dollars in securities that, redeemed at par, brought a tidy sum into the treasury.
C- Eager investors were meanwhile bidding up the price of the new 6% and 3% federal securities, dreaming of fortunes to come.
Topic Sentence: To a visiting British diplomat, the city’s future seemed utterly secure, capital or no capital.
Evidence:
A- The diplomat said New York “is certainly favored to be first city in North America, and this superiority it will most assuredly retain whatever spot be made seat of government.”
Topic Sentence: It was an arresting thought: henceforth the United States would have two centers, one governmental, the other economic.
Evidence:
A- The separation of powers, as emphatic as anything in the Constitution, had no parallel in the Western world.
1- London, Paris, Amsterdam, Berlin, Vienna, Rome, Madrid, Lisbon were capitals in the fullest sense of the word, hubs of national politics, business, and culture.
B- The New York promised to be the 1st of the U.S. that was independent of the apparatus of state power, was an augury of its uniqueness.
1- Nowhere else in the republic would the marketplace come to reign with such authority, or painters and politicians alike bow so low before gods of business and finance.
2- New York was no longer the capital city; its destiny was to be the city of capital.
Topic Sentence: Some New Yorkers wanted the city to become a center of industrial manufacturing too-filled with English-style factories, not just the small artisanal workshops with which it had long been well supplied.
Evidence:
A- In January 1789 at Rawson’s Tavern on Water Street, a committee of prominent businessmen formed the Society for the Encouragement of American Manufactures, commonly known as the New York Manufacturing Society.
B- The inception of a new federal gov’t, President Washington’s words of encouragement for the country’s infant textile industry, and the strength of the city’s capital market suggested that a large-scale manufacturing was an idea whose time had come.
1- Governor Clinton had been heard to say “the promotion of manufactures is at all times highly worthy of the attention of the government.”
C- No one surprised when nearly 2 hundred investors bought up all Manufacturing Society stock at 25 dollars per share.
(Page 307)
Topic Sentence: Before the year was out, the Manufacturing Society had opened a textile factory on Crown (later Liberty) Street.
Evidence:
A- Had a carding machine and two hand-operated spinning jennies, and it employed 14 weavers and 130 spinners, an impressive labor force by contemporary standards; also said to have cost $57,500-almost as much as the city spent to renovate Federal Hall.
B- Samuel Slater, a young Derbyshire immigrant, offered to build and install from memory the spinning Jennies whose design the British gov’t guarded as carefully as crowned jewels.
1- Factory managers turned him down and within a year or two were forced to close their doors.
C- Slater later moved to Pawtucket, Rhode Island, where he built the 1st successful cotton mill in the U.S. for the firm of Almy and Brown.
Topic Sentence: Advocates of manufacturing didn’t quit.
Evidence:
A- The New York Society for the Promotion of Agriculture, Arts, and Manufactures, founded in 1791 by Robert R. Livingston and others, remained for yrs as 1 of the country’s leading exponents of direct gov’t support for American industrial development.
B- Congress was bombarded with demands to protect infant industries from foreign (esp. British) competition by local organizations of manufactures and workingmen.
C- Individual entrepreneurs, including man British immigrants and New Englanders, went on experimenting with cotton mills, iron foundries, pottery works, breweries, and thread mills.
1- One visitor saw a cotton mill at Hell Gate on the East River on 1794.
Topic Sentence: The demise of the Manufacturing Society was nonetheless a signal that a large-scale industrial manufacturing faced immense obstacles in New York.
Evidence:
A- Manhattan lacked the water power necessary for mills and factories.
B- City real estate was already very expensive, almost prohibitively so for high-risk ventures that might take years to show a profit.
1- Inexperienced management, the lack of up-to-date technology, and competition from low-cost British imports compounded the problem.
2- Investors could almost always do better, with less danger, in shipping, insurance, and other mercantile enterprises, to say nothing of land speculation.
C- Over time more of New York’s merchants and financiers came to think of manufacturing as a nuisance.
It threatened to open competitive outlets for capital, they charged, while the protectionist trade policies advocated by its proponents posed a danger to the free movement of goods, money, and credit across national boundaries.